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Indiatimes serves up clutter-free revamp
India’s third-largest portal has a new, clean look, is heavy on video, and promises advertisers less intrusive options
No more pop-ups on Indiatimes.com! Bennett Coleman’s portal has unveiled a new look, which is not only clutter free, but also easy to navigate. Designed by global consultancy Human Factors International (HFI), the website is the result of extensive research over a year into what online readers want in India and abroad.
The revamped version has a lot of white space and the ads have been distributed evenly to reduce clutter. This is also a selling point for Indiatimes, which has hiked its ad rates post the revamp.
In the post pop-up world, Indiatimes says it will offer advertisers less intrusive options. This includes sponsored text links and sponsorship of certain sections on the site. The company is particularly upbeat about text links and claims that click-throughs have gone up by five times on the Google links.
The site also offers personalisation to users in terms of colour and resolution. Users can choose from seven colours to view pages, and choose a narrow or wide layout according to screen resolution. Starting with cricket, the other sections on the website will go in for a revamp over the next few months.
On its website, HFI said the new look was based on the “Schaffer-Weinschenk method of user-centred design”. It added that “attention was given to understanding the culture specific issues and motivations of Indians and non-resident Indians while interacting with these websites.”
The company will shortly be making announcements in the social networking and e-mail space, the spokesperson added.
According to Starcom Mediavest, the Indiatimes portal has 400 million pageviews per month, which makes it the third largest online property in India after Rediff and Yahoo.
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